Yunior García Aguilera is a Cuban actor, playwright, and activist, founder of Trébol Teatro and the Facebook group Archipiélago. He was born in Holguín, Cuba, in 1982.
His long and solid theatrical career began when he was just in fourth grade, writing and acting alongside classmates. In his hometown of Holguín, he joined the Asociación Hermanos Saíz (AHS), which allowed him to gain experience and publish his works. He took on the artistic directorship of the theater company Alas Buenas, whose play, Sangre, was awarded seven prizes at the National Festival of Small Format in Santa Clara.
At the age of 17, he entered the National School of Art (ENA), specializing in acting. In 2003, he founded the Trébol Teatro project alongside young actors who graduated from ENA, aiming to create a distinctive voice, a creative and innovative space. That same year, he completed his studies at the ISA (Higher Institute of Art) as an actor, graduating with honors.
He has written scripts for television and film. Cerdo (Fiction short film made in 2018) was presented at the 40th edition of the International Latin American Film Festival.
Yunior was one of the key figures of the November 27, 2020 (27N) protests that took place in front of the Ministry of Culture (MINCULT) by a group of artists, intellectuals, activists, and the general public, following the events that occurred at the San Isidro Movement headquarters the night before. On November 26, the police forcibly removed the young people who had taken refuge at that location in order to demand the government's release of rapper Denis Solís González. Some had also been on hunger strike for several days.
From this peaceful demonstration, a group was democratically elected to meet with the Deputy Minister of Culture, Fernando Rojas, and other government representatives. The aim was to engage in a dialogue to reach agreements that would respect creative freedoms, freedom of expression, and press freedom, as well as to put an end to the repression of artists whose work deviates from the official message established by the Cuban regime. Yunior was part of the group along with Katherine Bisquet, Tania Bruguera , Camila Acosta, and others.
The playwright made headlines again following the events that took place in Cuba on July 11, 2021 (11J), when people across the island spontaneously took to the streets in a historic demonstration against living conditions, government mismanagement, and the lack of freedoms. He was peacefully protesting alongside other young artists outside the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television (ICRT) when they were violently forced into a garbage truck by State Security agents.
Subsequently, he was transferred to the Vivac prison in Arroyo Naranjo and released days later with a precautionary measure that prevented him from leaving his home. From his house, García Aguilera became one of the most visible faces of this social uprising. He granted interviews to numerous international media outlets, where he defended the right of the Cuban people to build a different country while denouncing the violent repression that culminated in several disappearances and the unjust imprisonment of over 600 protesters.
In July 2021, the Cuban singer-songwriter Silvio Rodríguez published a statement questioning the police repression against the protesters during the 11J demonstrations. Yunior responded to Silvio with a post on his social media that quickly went viral, where he requested 15 minutes of dialogue with the musician. A few days later, this meeting took place at the Ojalá studios of the troubadour.
García Aguilera defines himself as "a civic artist who wants to build a better country where his son can express his thoughts without facing violence on the streets and can think freely without having to emigrate". He does not consider himself a politician, but rather "a citizen who promotes ideas, seeking to transform his reality and advocating for a horizontal leadership, based on consensus, where collective intelligence prevails and the power and decisions do not rest on a single figure".*(1)
On August 9, 2021, Archipiélago was created, a Facebook group that has more than 23,000 followers and aims to give a voice to all Cubans who want to build a new Cuba, including those in exile and the diaspora, while also setting concrete goals for that construction.
Those objectives are:
1. Fight for the freedom of all the individuals who were detained on July 11, 2021.
2. Attempt to carry out the first peaceful anti-government demonstration authorized with all legal guarantees, without repression or violent actions.
3. Call for a plebiscite with all the guarantees provided for in the 2019 constitution that allows the sovereign will of the people of Cuba to be decided at the polls.
In September 2021, Archipiélago requested authorization from the Government to march against violence in Havana on November 20th. In the following days, other provinces of the island submitted similar requests to their respective Provincial Government offices, thus joining the call.
Like other activists, Yunior has been besieged in his own home, preventing him from moving freely. He has been interrogated several times by State Security officials and is subjected to daily harassment by the repressive forces, even being monitored by as many as eight agents at once.
On October 4, 2021, the Center for Studies on the Rule of Law, Cuba Próxima, announced the inclusion of the playwright in its Deliberative Council.
Source:
(1) and (2) taken from Proyecto Archipiélago, interview with Mónica Baró, August 13, 2021, 23yFlagler
